1. Field
One embodiment of the invention relates generally to an information processing apparatus such as a personal computer, and more particularly to an information processing apparatus including a heat radiation module.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, portable personal computers of various types, such as a laptop type and a notebook type, have been developed. This type of computer includes heating devices such as a CPU, a display controller, a hard disk drive and a bus bridge device.
As a cooling mechanism for cooling the heating devices, there is known a heat radiation module which makes use of, e.g. a fan and a heat radiation fin (heat sink).
Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2002-357317 discloses a power supply apparatus having a function of detecting clogging of an air inlet/outlet port. In this power supply apparatus, when a difference between an outside temperature and a temperature in the power supply apparatus exceeds a predetermined range, it is detected that abnormality has occurred at the air inlet/outlet port of the power supply apparatus, and a process of turning off the apparatus is executed.
In the meantime, the load of the information processing apparatus, such as a computer, varies greatly depending on the content of a process that is to be executed. In accordance with the variation of the load, the temperature in the vicinity of the heating device varies. For example, in the case where the load on the computer rises instantaneously, the heat, which surpasses the heat radiation performance of the heat radiation module, is produced from the heating device, and thereby the temperature in the vicinity of the heating device temporarily rises. Subsequently, the dissipation of the heat by the heat radiation module progresses and the temperature in the vicinity of the heating device gradually falls within a certain temperature range. In this manner, the temperature in the vicinity of the heating device varies in accordance with the variation of the load.
Thus, if the presence/absence of the decrease in performance of the heat radiation module is simply determined on the basis of only the result of comparison between the temperature outside the computer and the temperature within the computer, it would be possible that a temporary increase in load is erroneously determined as a decrease in performance of the heat radiation module.
In addition, in usual cases, in order to measure the performance of the heat radiation module, the user is required to perform an operation for starting a purpose-specific checking program for the performance measurement of the heat radiation module.
In this case, although the performance of the heat radiation module can be measured during a specific period in which the checking program is being executed, it is not possible to measure the performance of the heat radiation module in an ordinary operation state of the computer, in which the checking program is not executed. It is necessary, therefore, to realize a novel function for precisely detecting the performance of the heat radiation module.